Discovering Information – Starting Over, 02-16-05

Today is a day where some of the women hope to find out information they have been waiting for. Denise will have to keep waiting, and Rachael is shocked. Bethany is delighted to finally have at least a morsel of the information she has waited four years for.

Iyanla meets with Rachael so early that Rachael is still in her bathrobe. Of course, she also has the purple throw draped around her shoulders, as usual. She is anchored and grounded, waiting for information for the last forty-eight hours on her biological father. Iyanla tells her the private eye has called to say she has located him. Rachael’s response is, “That means I have to get dressed.” She is hoping for the worst, and hopes her fears are correct, as it will be so much easier.

Candy, Cassie and Ermanno are talking in the kitchen. Ermanno tells the women he doesn’t think Denise’s progress is where she thinks it is. He wants to make sure she is one hundred percent committed. Candy asks Ermanno how he feels to come home to a messy house every day. He says tired, and thinks he could get used to it being clean every day.

Iyanla moves on to a one-on-one with Renee, and asks her why she thinks the phone conversation wit her mom went badly. Renee thinks her mom is in denial and finding excuses to the problem. This all leads to her feeling abandoned all over again. Yet she is so determined. Iyanla feels they must find a way to get Renee’s mom to the Starting Over house for a fierce conversation.

Dr. Stan is wondering how it was that Bethany moved quickly form a happy child to a strict, religious woman. Bethany arrives for her self-hypnosis session. He tells her this will help her concentrate on just one thing. He will be offering her suggestions to stimulate her thought process. Immediately felt like I was in junior high again putting each other in trances at slumber parties, as Dr. Stan starts talking to her about her eyes getting very heavy.

Dr. Stan tells her to think back to December 2000. He tells her to think about current events, remembering it was a strange election result year. He says Gladiator was the number one movie. This all sparks something for her as she remembers everyone kept asking her about the presidents when she was in the hospital. Dr. Stan asks her to remember waking up that morning. She remembers the smell of the Christmas tree and gets scared. Dr. Stan urges Bethany it’s okay to remember.

Bethany now remembers the black dress again. She had remembered it a few days earlier as well. It’s not on anybody; it’s in the closet. It’s long with a draped neck and a bow in the back, and Bethany says it was awful. It was her singing group dress, she remembers. She was to have wore it in a concert the night of the day she woke up sick. When Dr. Stan asks what she was going to sing, she begins to cry.

Bethany has a sudden memory of being in the car laughing and having a good time. They got in an accident with the guy in front of them. She and her mom were slightly hurt in the crash. The man in the car in front had been drunk and pulled out in front of them.

Thoughts of a bat now come in to Bethany’s mind. She remember now playing first base on a softball team and that she would spin the bat three times before she would hit. She would hit it to the fence, but never over. She remembers the girls. Dr. Stan asks who the catcher was and she says Emily. Her own number was 19. She gasps as she realizes that’s where her email address comes from.

Bethany’s mind switches to a bathing suit, a green and blue one. She’s seventeen when wearing it. She can’t figure out why she’s wearing it, and says it makes no sense. There’s a lot of people there, and they’re all wearing the same swim suit as her. It’s about to be her turn and she is very nervous. She cries, “Oh … oh!”

Pushing on, Bethany realizes she’s supposed to be swimming the two-hundred meter, but doesn’t want to. Asked by Dr. Stan if she was a good swimmer, she compares herself to a mermaid. She adds they said she looked pretty, but she’s not. She can’t believe the memories that are coming back, but is very tired. Dr. Stan decides this is enough for today.

Iyanla and Rachael meet with the private investigator. Rachael is completely thrown for a loop when she hears about her father. He is a property owner and homeless outreach program director, and is three years older than Rachael’s mom. Rachael asks if his criminal record revealed anything, and the private investigator says that wasn’t checked. She could check, but it would take longer than forty-eight hours.

After the private investigator leaves, Iyanla tells Rachael she just wants the criminal check for evidence she was right. Iyanla knows Rachael was programmed to only expect bad things from her dad, and suggests if she has questions about it to ask him directly. Iyanla asks if Rachael should be judged now for her horrible behavior when she was twelve to sixteen.

Iyanla tells Rachael it’s her choice whether to contact him or not, but urges her to do so with an open heart. Asked what her mom would want her to do if she was alive still, Rachael just gets very flustered. She tells Iyanla she wants to go home. Iyanla asks where that is, and she says back to the Starting Over house.

“Talk to me,” Iyanla tells Rachael, and asks if she’s speaking to twelve-year-old Rachael or twenty-year-old Rachael. Rachael still doesn’t feel safe here, and Iyanla says she’s so resistant it doesn’t matter where she is. She also tells her if she’s twelve-year-old Rachael, she doesn’t want her alone with her thoughts without adult supervision, because she knows how twelve-year-old Rachael thinks. Rachael is still beside herself, and Iyanla tells her she can talk to Dr. Stan about it that night.

Ermanno tells Denise he has a surprise for her and gives her the report card he prepared for her. Denise doesn’t like what she sees. She was given a D on listening skills, and not a single A. For being loving and kind she gets a B. She asks if he’s judging the old Denise, but Ermanno says no, he’s judging the new one. He thinks she still says inappropriate things. She admits feeling pretty crappy right now. This is just a start, Ermanno says, as Denise needs to continue this back at home. If she doesn’t keep the changes at home it’s all worthless. Denise says good-bye to Ermanno and now accepts his grading. She still needs work.

Renee tries talking to her mom on the phone again about coming to the Starting Over house. Her mom says she doesn’t want to be ostracized by strangers on National TV. She feels she did the best she could do without a father in the home, as he wasn’t ever around after the divorce. After the phone call, Renee is frustrated and upset, but needs to know her mom will be there through thick and thin for her.

Iyanla meets with Renee about the phone call. Renee says her intention was for her mom to listen to her. Iyanla decides she will intervene. She and Renee will call her mom together, and Iyanla will talk of her intentions. She thinks this could be the cause of some powerful healing.

While waiting for Dr. Stan, Rachael fills the other women in on what she learned of her dad, how he owns property in Nevada and is a homeless outreach program director. She was taught to hate him, and it’s hard to hear good news. She wished he was dead, as it would have been so much easier. Cassie knows that Rachael is so afraid of the truth, as she doesn’t want any more letdowns.

Rachael moves on to her meeting with Dr. Stan and Iyanla, and tells them that journaling and talking with the other women helped her deal with it a great deal. Iyanla asks what her gut says, and Rachael says that she feels deceived and lied to. She wonders if her family worries if he’ll tell her their secrets. Iyanla says she might lost her aunts, and asks if Rachael is worried about being cut off. She tells her she could lost her last connection to her mom. Rachael believes it’s the right time to contact him.

Meanwhile, Denise didn’t get the information she wanted. She wanted to be told she was graduating, and now she has just begun to doubt if she is ready. Rachael was completely blindsided by this information, and knows she has been lied to at some point by someone. Bethany is just beginning to get this information, and has discovered it hasn’t been erased, but put in long term storage. Discovering it all is going to be so fun for her … and us.